Tag Archives: Ira Lightman

For want of a cuppa
I wouldn'a had bus change
from a £5 promissory portrait
of the monarch, right
for its dates
in the limited edition of
ink on cotton rag fibre and
"colours which are
difficult to balance
on photocopiers" (Peter Symes);
or need to pee
at Birmingham New Street
urgently; disembark,
cheapskate
with two cases
on the X48 from Newman
University interview.
No taxi for me
and time? No, O Maxx
next to old
entrance
but to scout kerb
encumberance, where fellow
bussies had pointed.
(They'd liked me in suit,
justice scale
of bagged books, siphoning
the courier carriage cost
to buy tickets
from home to Llandrindod,
booked 6 in advance
of this call to B'rum
one week ago.)
I and the cases
met accessibility
politics, from North
to Midlands to West
until the station
under refurbishment
and its (indicated
only by human index
finger) entrance.
Threading white concourse
I reversed
at the barrier,
gave card to machine
and its printout
to a human,
through
to where loos
are,
where sign is "not for construction
workers
for nothing".
Nothing's what I'd pay
unless
double or quits.
Why exchange coinage?
Why not
urinate there
and then on recladded
Victorian public
work unupkept?
"Clean this, and my tarnish,
I'm your boss,"
I seem to solo
in my time among
turnstiles
to push prow
on wheels. I wait
for the cleaner.
I hear her
I imagine reword
the injunction
to constructing
man spitting,
orange jacket
on back
inside closing cubicle
"YOW NEED THE TOI-
LET, WHEN YOW
'RE BUILDING THIS STA-
SHUN!" He angles
his trochees.
Monosyllable nouns
toy he will
stay where
he's exiled
till vacant.
Wise to injunctions
and care
she's supposed
to police
here. Befuddled
all made circus,
I leave. And
return. "Can
I come
on the
same 30 pence?" "Yes."
Seen by loo,
last of my interview suit.

Ira Lightman is a poet, author of 3 books and several chapbooks. In his double
column poems (Trancelated atwww.ubu.com/ubu) he employs quoted text and
translations in collages. He makes public art, organizing a community’s poems
into visual art. He broadcasts on BBC Radio 3’s The Verb. He has set Creeley,
Gunn and Sward &c to ukulele.